


a translation for “distress”

by tactician (5H4E)



Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016)
Genre: M/M, Not really a graphic depiction of violence; but a depiction of the aftermath thereof & a wound, tagged just in case!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-24
Updated: 2017-03-24
Packaged: 2018-10-09 23:08:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,007
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10423860
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/5H4E/pseuds/tactician
Summary: “You are, objectively speaking, the worst,”K2SO tends to Cassian’s wounds when he really wants to kill him.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I’ve been seeing a few people write Cassian as one who shows concern for others through anger and frustration, and that he’s not great with expressing affection, and it’s cute, but I don’t think it really matches Cassian’s personality. K2’s, on the other hand…

“You are, objectively speaking, the _worst_ ,”

It was supposed to be a simple mission: meet a whistle-blower under a fake name, retrieve the decrypted cypher to decode intercepted Imperial intelligence, get away without a struggle. Cassian had a blaster holstered around his chest and hidden under his jacket (an adapted A280, _covert field edition_ , K2 retrospectively notes sardonically). K2SO had been told – against all probability of success – to remain in the ship.

K2SO therefore does not know how the fight broke out. All he knows is by the time he had left the ship and reached the bar (too public for an all-out ambush, yet too private to be safe from poison, or a blaster under the table; either way, whistle-blowers are dishonourable, and spies fight dirty) Cassian had a stab wound just under his ribs, and bleeding knuckles. K2’s heat sensors indicated the barrel of the blaster, gripped tightly in Cassian’s right hand, was still warm. Fired recently and repeatedly. Cassian – running on adrenaline, covered in blood – had hissed “I got them, Kay. It’s done,” around laboured, rattling breaths, whilst limping to the bar. K2SO had watched as he’d grabbed a bottle of some brand of firewater, gulping down a mouthful of the liquid, and proceeded to collapse, rather pathetically, to the floor.

K2SO had ended up having to carry Cassian back to the ship. Though the mission had been a technical success – the information, taken from the whistle-blower’s corpse, is now stored away in K2SO’s databank – K2SO’s still angry with him as he plants Cassian down on the lid of the toilet of the ships ‘fresher, with a softness that betrays his concern, and walks over to the medicine cabinet, collecting a medical kit amidst his complaints.

Cassian snorts – only 10% amused, and 30% pretending to be, because the alternative is simply pain, and 60% inebriated: 20% on painkillers, 20% on alcohol, 20% on adrenaline, K2SO calculates – as he slowly peels off his jacket, fingers clumsy as they try to unclasp the buckle of the holster strapped across his chest. K2SO’s receptors whir with impatience, finding this current arrangement not of the optimum efficiency, considering the time it takes for Cassian to get each article of clothing off. He looms over the man, bent low at the waist, and his fingers – longer, thinner, more careful than Cassian’s own – replace Cassian’s at the ties of his shirt, and begin the process of untying, and prying off of Cassian’s body. Cassian has to lean forward to get the shirt over his head, and he can’t bite back the gasp of pain as K2SO manoeuvres him.

“Don’t move,” K2 says, when Cassian fidgets under his digits, the muscles in his stomach twitching, clenching, against the sudden cold. “You are already injured, I do not want to make it worse,” is his explanation.

“Aren’t you considerate?”

“ _Actually_ ,” K2 says, not looking up from his work, “I am furious with you,” he punctuates this point by dropping Cassian’s shirt and jacket in an undignified heap on the floor of the ‘fresher, carelessly. Though, frankly, they’re pretty much ruined already, sliced up and blood-soaked as they are, but that is beside the _point_. This is about _principles_ ; about making a _statement_.

Cassian doesn’t say anything to that. Instead, he leans back against the wall behind him, propped up by a rolled up towel K2SO places behind his lower back. K2SO watches him, can see the slight shiver that runs down Cassian’s body, from his shoulders, down his arms, leaving gooseflesh in its wake. Reaching for the antiseptic in the first aid box K2SO retrieved, Cassian sets to dampening a washcloth with it, and pressing it to the wound with a broken sounding whine.

“I hope your recklessness was worth it,” K2SO continues, as he assesses the damage. It is not deep, just ugly and wet and red. There is a danger, all the same. “It would be an incalculable shame if you did not live to see the cypher _actually_ reach its destination.”

The corner of Cassian’s lips quirk upwards. He closes his eyes, and would almost look peaceful if not for the blood splattered across his face, down his chest, seeping from the stab wound in his side. Still, K2SO prefers Cassian in these moments of relative calm, when he forgets to be stoical. That it is pain that preoccupies Cassian is an unfortunate outcome, but K2SO will take what he can get for now, and calculate the probability of Cassian knowing such casual peace in the future, and endeavour towards that eventuality.

There is a pause, the room silent aside from the steady hum of K2SO’s internal mechanisms whirring, and Cassian’s breathy little noises of pain as he dabs at his wound. K2SO suspects Cassian agrees with him to some degree.

“It had to be done,” is all Cassian has to say on the matter, his tone laced with an undefinable edge, and his eyes open to watch K2SO fiddle with surgical string and a needle, impossibly both deft and awkwardly uncertain. “Do you know what you’re doing, Kay?”

“I don’t appreciate you doubting me when I’m the sole reason you’re not bleeding out on the floor of a frankly disgusting little bar on a rather unremarkable planet.”

“Would you prefer for me to bleed out on the toilet of our ship, instead?” And Cassian even has the _gall_ to grin.

K2SO makes an indignant whirring noise as his head shoots up, his visual receivers lifting from the needle in his hand, to Cassian’s face. “Your smart comments are unnecessary,” he says, as he turns the needle over, and over again, examining it.

Cassian doesn’t say anything more for a while, but then, gently, as if guiding a child, “you’re meant to thread the needle, Kay,” and he reaches across the small gap between them and guides the thread through the metal loop of the needle, his fingers seeming so small beside K2S0’s.

Years ago, organics created personality drives in their droids for the purpose of better communication – heavy-duty walls of coding designed to translate the semiotics of organic linguistics, turning arbitrary patterns of words into calculable equations and algorithms. To read between the lines, as it were. K2 knows that when he says “I am furious with you”, what he means is “I thought I’d lost you; please don’t do that to me again”. What he does not know is how it is possible for a droid to feel such a redundant, _organic_ principal such as concern.

Cassian’s fingers tremble slightly, as he threads the needle.

There are many things K2SO wants to say: ‘ _you are as familiar to me as the casing of my external frame’,_ or _‘droids don’t have possessions but you are the one thing I can lay claim to’,_ or _‘my hard-drive has no data pertaining to ‘self-sacrifice’’._

What he _actually_ says is “you are ridiculous. You are infinitely fragile yet you _constantly_ throw yourself into danger, you stupid man.”

“Oh, get on with it,” Cassian says, lightly, then moves his arm out of the way, staring down at himself as K2 holds the point of the needle to his skin. K2SO’s visual receptors, moon-white and just slightly too bright against the black in-between of his face, flicker between the stab wound under Cassian’s ribs, and Cassian’s face – pale, blood-spattered, sweat-shining. His expression is soft, readable in ways it not often is, and Cassian gasps only a little bit when K2SO first punctures his skin with the surgical needle.

Cassian is soft and breakable. One of K2SO’s massive metal hands is splayed against Cassian’s stomach to hold him in place, and should K2SO wish to, or should he make a miscalculation, he could crush Cassian easily. The human skeleton is embarrassingly fragile, and neither of them is unaware of the carefully calculated precision and gentleness of every motion K2SO makes around Cassian. The sheer size of K2SO is impossible to forget in this nearly claustrophobic space, hulking over Cassian, who looks so small underneath him. Every organic motion – every microscopic twitch or pull of muscle, every blink, every breath – is distinct against the droid’s controlled, impassive form.

It is a strange configuration, K2SO decides.

Centuries of organic endeavour – of remarkable scientific development in the sentience of droids – has resulted in a faulty KX-series enforcer droid, defected from the Galactic Empire, stitching up the wounds of an emotionally constipated, self-destructive human rebel. Such scientific advancements have resulted in K2SO _doting_ on this brat of a rebel captain.

“There, pull it through,” Cassian breathes, his voice slurring around pain. He’s still gripping the damp washcloth in one hand, blood and alcohol dripping onto his thigh idly, but it is doubtful Cassian is really aware of it. Instead, he’s preoccupied with talking K2SO through tending to his wounds, drowsy and punch-drunk though he is. It’s quiet otherwise. That is probably the worst part of it all; that this is the conclusion of an undesirable outcome – that Cassian is relaxed like this only after a covert mission turned violent. That a stab wound is required for Cassian to drop his guard. But then Cassian grins, baring his teeth in that happy way humans do, with a casual ease that takes years off his face – and K2SO’s fans hum at the flush of heat it triggers.

“I’m still angry with you, you know,” K2SO says, after a while, following Cassian’s guidance obediently.

Cassian sighs, his expression going blank for a moment. “I know, Kay,” he looks up at K2SO’s face, a warm – if apologetic – expression on his face, and the corners of his mouth flicker upwards; a flirtation of a smile; “I know,”

He is high on adrenaline and painkillers, K2SO reminds himself. He slurs his words, and barks a harsh laugh when K2SO fumbles with the needle, just slightly too small in his hands. K2SO was not built for medicinal care, but Cassian needs him, so he diligently stitches the wound closed. Cassian shifts, pressing his shoulders hard against the cool of the wall behind him – he shudders against it, then grunts when he pulls on his stitches. K2SO inattentively smacks Cassian’s knee, so gently it’s almost a pat.

“I said hold still,”

He pulls the final stitch through, before hesitating, looking up at Cassian expectantly. He tilts his head slightly in question, and Cassian smiles lopsidedly.

“You’re precious,” he snickers, wincing slightly. “Now you have to tie it off,” he says, gesturing unhelpfully. Fortunately, K2SO knows how to tie things, which he reminds Cassian, fingers pulling on the thread gently to make a tight knot.

“There,” Cassian says, exhaling with relief. K2SO scans the organic for any additional injuries. This is only a rudimentary fix, of course. Whether Cassian likes it or not, K2SO is taking him to the medical bay on Yavin 4 as soon as possible, for proper medical care. Which means he needs to get back to the cockpit to set the co-ordinates, which means he needs to leave Cassian.

“You should rest,” K2SO says, before rising to his full height over Cassian, who starts to shift, a pained expression flashing across his features. To his credit, he does a decent job of hiding it, but K2SO knows Cassian too well to be fooled, and Cassian is too drowsy to be convincing. “I will take you,” K2SO says, and he leans down. Cassian, despite snorting indignantly, reaches up for the droid expectantly. He curls his arms around Cassian, one supporting his back, the other supporting his legs, and lifts him as if he is weightless.

Carrying him out of the ‘fresher, and heading in the direction of his sleeping quarters, K2SO quietly says “perhaps _don’t_ nearly die, next time?” It is meant to be sardonic, but there’s an undeniable edge of hurt cutting through it, and Cassian looks abashed, his cheeks flushing, as he stares at a tiny scratch on K2SO’s chassis; so unnoticeable that the fact that Cassian spots it betrays their closeness.

“I will try not to die any time soon, Kay,”

**Author's Note:**

> \- ‘Firewater’ is apparently a type of alcohol according to the wiki; I have no idea what I actually is, but I chose it because the name is just vague enough to be believable.
> 
> I wrote this imagining that Cassian is considerably younger than he is in the film, but since I tend to write Cassian as acting much younger around K2 than how he usually acts, you can interpret this as taking place whenever you see fit. 
> 
> I started this fic p. much as soon as I saw the film, got stuck on it, as I do with most fics, and then came back to it a few months later.


End file.
